When Rome's In Ruins
by myhomeistheshire
Summary: An op goes terribly wrong, and Natasha loses her memory. Clint doesn't know how to get her back.
1. Chapter 1

It was a bad plan from the start.

"You've got to be kidding!" Clint had burst out when Fury had first explained the situation. "You're sending her in there alone, with no extraction plan and no idea what kind of security they have? She'll be _blind."_

"Clint." Natasha said in a level voice. He stopped talking, but he didn't look any less incredulous.

"It's just recon." Fury continued. "We need to know what they're protecting. All we know so far is that it's Asgardian, and potentially dangerous. I'm not comfortable sending in a less experienced agent -" Clint made a frustrated noise in the back of his throat, and Fury shot him a look - "and to send in more than one person would risk blowing our cover."

"Of course." Natasha replied calmly, silently willing her partner to shut up for just this once.

"If you're sending her in alone, at least let me go as backup." Clint persisted. "I'll stay on the sidelines with the comms in case anything goes wrong. They won't even know I'm there."

Fury was silent for a moment. "Fine." He acquisced. "But Barton, if you put so much as a toe out of line, I _will_ have you assigned to regulatory ops for as long as necessary."

Clint nodded his agreement, and Fury looked down at the papers on his desk in a clear dismissal.

As soon as they were out in the hallway, Clint turned towards her.

"Don't say it," Natasha warned.

"I just want you to be careful, alright?" He said doggedly.

"We've done much more dangerous jobs than this easily." Natasha reminded him.

"Yeah, _we._ Not a solo operation. Not going into enemy territory completely blind."

"It's recon." She was getting exhasperated now. "And you'll be there anyways, in case I get into trouble."

"I have a bad feeling about it."

_"Really,_ Clint? You want me to quit a job because you have a hunch?" Her words came out harsher than she intended.

"I'm not asking you to drop it, I just want you to triple check every step you make. We don't know what these people are capable of, or what kind of weapon they're protecting."

"I promise I'll be careful." She said finally, and Clint grinned.

"That's all I was asking for."

It was less than 24 hours later when everything went wrong.

They'd arrived in Bangkok using one of the S.H.I.E.L.D. jets, and Natasha had done her first walk-around of the place before heading in. The security was impeccable, so rather than creating a fake persona she instead was going to have to use the less-foolproof way and fight her way into the building, and once inside she would have to blend in.

"Be safe." Clint reminded her one last time before she went in, and she gave him a crisp nod before he blended into the crowd.

It didn't take her long to sneak up behind a guard and knock him out, using his ID card to get through the first level of security. After that she snagged a lab coat that was hanging over a chair and looked like every other person on the floor. Now she just needed to find out what they were hiding behind all of the lab testing. She strolled through the area casually, noticing which areas had more security than others. When she reached those areas, she'd repeat her earlier method of grabbing one of the high-access personnel and using them to get past the increasingly difficult security measures - fingerprint and retinal scanners, DNA tests, etc. When Natasha came through the fifth door, the hallway on the other side was empty, with a single door at the end.

"I think I found it." She said into the comms, striding down the hall and kicking the door open.

"Keep me updated." Clint replied, but his voice was staticky and clipped in and out. Natasha wasn't too worried - either they had something to keep outside interference from this room, or the object itself was making this happen. Either way, her comms would start working again once she was out.

The door swung open to show a large, dark room with only a pedestal in the middle. As she walked closer, she saw something swirling not on the pedestal but above it - a cloud of what looked like dark energy. Damn. She needed something else, something that said something about what it was. She glanced around the room, but there wasn't so much as a desk in the room. She glanced at her watch. She had approximately a minute before the people she'd knocked out and stuffed in various places would wake up. So if she just -

The door slammed open, and Natasha whirled around. There were five guards coming toward her, led by a woman with long brown hair. Six in total; she could do that. So much for recon, though -

The thought stuck in her mind as she looked a little closer at the woman's face. Her hair wasn't brown after all, it was a dark auburn, and how had she _missed_ that familiar smirk?

"Hello, Natasha." Ivania said coyly.

"I've gotta say, I wasn't expecting to see you, Ivania." Natasha replied smoothly. "It's been what, eight years?"

"Nine." The other woman corrected. "And it's nice to see that you still aren't able to keep your nose out of places you don't belong, like always."

Natasha's brain was going haywire, calculating her escape probability. It didn't look good.

"So this is what you've been doing recently?" She asked, stalling for time. "Studying Asgardian technology?"

"Oh, this isn't _technology,_ dear." Ivania drawled. Her accent had changed over the years - Natasha could only barely pick up on the slight hint of russian underneath the english accent. "And what else was I supposed to do after the Red Room? Run off and play vigilante, like you? No, I stayed with the group. You should have stayed with me - you can't even _imagine_ all of the possibilities we've had our eyes opened to."

"Well, I'd love to hear all about it, but as it happens I've got an appointment." Natasha quipped, and then immediately ran at one of the guards, kicking him in the head and propelling herself into another one, cutting off his airway with one arm while knocking the feet out from another guard. And then she was settling into the rythm of duck, punch, twist, snap - it was like a dance. Until Ivania joined the fight.

After that she was just trying to stay alive.

She could've taken Ivania alone - but other guards were filtering in, surrounding them, and with her focus trained on the other assassin she was vulnerable to their blows. She could feel herself getting worn down even as she moved faster than ever to dodge them all. Ivania slipped a kick in that got her right in the rib cage, making her breath come in tight gasps. She was taking out the guards as fast as she could, but for every one that fell to the ground there was another to replace it. She felt her ankle break, and she slid to the ground, rolling over and trying to thrust herself back to her feet, but a sharp pain ran through her head and her vision faded to black.

The first thing she heard when she regained consciousness was the whispering. Too low to make out anything, though. She opened her eyes cautiously. They were still in the room with the Asgardian weapon - whatever it was - except now she was chained to a metal chair. Ivania, three guards, and a man in a lab coat were the only other people in the room.

"Oh good, you're awake." Ivania spoke up from where she'd been whispering to the man. "It's time we get started, then."

_Torture._ Damn it. She was prepared for it, of course, but a former student of the Red Room was sure to have a few extra tricks up her sleeve.

"I'm sure you know that this is all unnecessary." She said in a bored voice.

"Oh, Natasha." Ivania said with a smirk. "You don't think I would try torture with you? No, I know you'd never tell us anything. We're going with something more...traditional." She gestured at the dark mass still teeming above the pedestal. Natasha's heart sank.

"So what does this do?" She asked, still keeping her calm-and-slightly-bored tone.

"You'll see soon enough." Ivania replied gleefully, nodding at the guards who came and unshackled one of Natasha's hands. She immediately lashed out, but was only able to snap one of their wrists before the other two grabbed onto her hand tightly. They brought it towards the dark energy, and for the first time in a long time, Natasha was really truly afraid.

Her fingers brushed the edge of the mass, and an agonizing pain shot through her. She couldn't tell if she'd screamed or not. And then her hand was plunged all the way in, and her life started to unfold before her eyes.

* * *

_помогите мне. मलाई मदत. pomozite mi. help me. hilf mir. дапамажыце мне. I don't know where I am. qui sim nesciam._

_help me._

She becomes vaguely aware of being marched down a hallway. The lights blind her, and the armed men escorting her won't meet her eyes. Who is she, where is she, what is this place? As they exit the building, one of the guards says something in a strange language, but she _understands_ it. They are words mangling together in her head, impulses moving through her skin. She forces them down as the guards leave her standing in the cool air. _What do I do?_ She turns around just as a man turns the corner and rushes towards her, a worried expression on his face.

"Thank god. I was getting worried when the comms shut off. Did you have any trouble?"

"Trouble?" The word barely make its way past her lips. "With - with what?"

"With the operation. Did you find it?"

"Find what? I don't - I don't know what you're talking about." Tears are threatening to spill over, and the man's expression changes in an instant.

"Natasha, what's wrong?"

_Natasha. Is that my name?_ She should feel some familiarity towards this man, or the name that is supposedly hers, but she doesn't. She doesn't feel anything.

"Natasha, snap out of it! What did they do to you?" She hears fear, raw fear in his voice now. "For god's sake, Nat, _talk_ to me!"

"Nevím, kdo jsem."

"Dammit, Nat, you know I don't speak czech - speak russian, if you need to -"

"I don't know who I am."

There's a thunderous silence.

"What?"

"I - I don't know who I am. I don't know who you are, I don't know where I am or why I keep speaking different languages without realizing it -"

The man's face seems set in stone.

"You can help me, right?" She asks. "You know me. You can tell me who I am - you can help me remember."

There is a long pause.

"Yeah." He says, finally. "My name's Clint. We have to catch a flight."

The flight is long, and terrifying. Clint answers all of her questions with a terse assurance that someone would be able to explain it once they got back. _Back where? Home?_

They arrived on a landing strip at a large building, which she follows Clint into. They ride the elevator to one of the top floors, and she nearly runs to catch up with him as he throws open a large set of doors.

"Barton, you'd better have a _damn_ good reason for bursting in here like this." The speaker is a man with an eyepatch who looks even more terrifying than the guards who'd thrown her out of the first building.

"They did something to her." Clint says, his voice terse. "She's lost her memory."

_"What?"_ Now the man stands up, pushing his chair back. "If this is your idea of a practical joke -"

"It's Natasha." Clint replies simply, and the other man seems to accept this as an explanation.

"How -"

"It must be the object." Clint's voice now sounds desperate. "We just need to get it back, and we'll be able to reverse it."

"We can do that?" She speaks up, and both men looked over at her in surprise, like they'd forgotten she could speak. Well, at least this time she'd spoken in english. She's pretty sure.

"We'll try." The man replies, nodding at Clint. "Bring her to her room."

Clint nods, and as she's walking out the door, she thinks she hears him say _I can't lose her._

She doesn't want to lose herself, either.


	2. Chapter 2

She doesn't sleep that night. There are too many things running through her head, questions and languages and flashes that don't seem to add up. She searches the room, but it almost seems like a hotel room, with only a few carefully folded pairs of clothing and a couple basic necessities. _What kind of person lives like this?_ She wonders. When she goes to change into a pair of pajamas, she discovers guns and knives hidden up and down the suit she was wearing. She throws them across the room and carefully positions herself across the room from them. She takes off the necklace, too, staring at it for a moment before carefully placing it on the nightstand. Natasha didn't seem like a person for sentimentality, yet the necklace seems to hold some deeper meaning. Whatever it is, she can't wear it. Can't pretend to be that person anymore.

She falls asleep curled on top of the covers, still in the jeans and t-shirt she'd found in the sparsely stocked closet, and when she wakes hours later she has crease lines on her skin and sleep in her eyes but she still doesn't feel like she belongs. Not here, in this giant building with all of these people looking at her and seeing someone else.

She avoids the mirror while she's brushing her teeth, and heads down the halls in her bare feet. She doesn't do it on purpose, just doesn't realize until it was too late and she's worried about too many other things to care. She barges in on two men - the one with the eyepatch from the day before, and another middle-aged man with a kind look on his face.

"Romanoff." The first man says, not sounding surprised. She flinches.

"I'd _prefer_ -" Her voice is too loud, too harsh and demanding, so she starts again, quieter - "I'd prefer if you didn't call me that."

"Alright." He's unfazed. "I didn't formally introduce myself yesterday. My name is Nick Fury, I'm the director of S.H.I.E.L.D. This here is Phil Coulson."

He keeps talking but her vision is narrowed and there are a million films running inside her head, blood and bruises and briefcases, all stamped with an eagle and the bold block letters of S.H.I.E.L.D. She doesn't realize she's fallen to the ground until she feels the cold floor against her cheek. A hand brushes her shoulder, and before she can think she's on her feet and has the hand bent back as far as the wrist will go without breaking. She registers that it belongs to the man with the kind face, and she drops it like a hot coal.

"I'm - I'm sorry." She says, but she's not sure what language she says it in. She takes a step back._ I'm a monster_, she thinks, but that's not entirely true. _She_ isn't anyone. She's an imposter, a consciousness taking over someone else's body. So when she runs out of the room and past door after door after door, feet slapping along cold linoleum, faces staring after her, she doesn't feel terrible.

She doesn't feel anything.

(that's a lie. she feels everything. she feels too much. she wishes she didn't.)

Weeks pass - weeks of hiding, of not-knowing, of hearing whispers behind doors that were always about her - but nothing much changes. Nothing that she knows of, at least. She hears theory after theory of how they're going to throw her out into the abyss to get Natasha back. They don't phrase it like that, of course. But she still resents Natasha a little. Why should she get this life? This life of terror, and heartbreak, and not knowing anything past the beating of her heart but_ at least she is alive_. She can't look at Clint, not at all, because when she looks into his eyes she sees the person he wants her to be, and she can't stand the pain she's causing him just by existing. There's too much pain, and she's responsible for more than her fair share of it.

So when she ends up on the roof, she knows this was inevitable. She wasn't meant for this, wasn't meant to handle all these languages and talents and so many sets of memories that she isn't sure what's real. Maybe none of this is. Maybe she'll just step off the ledge and wake up, from some terrible nightmare. Maybe.

She doesn't believe that, not really. Or maybe she does. She doesn't even believe herself right now.

She feels the cool breeze rush through her hair, hears the sound of the streets, far below. And then one, distinct sound. Footsteps.

She turns around and sees him, and she isn't surprised because isn't it always him? Isn't it always him, who shows up to save the day even when she desperately wishes he wouldn't.

"Please." His voice is breaking, and so is she. She's shattering, bits of her glittering in the sunlight like a million tiny stars.

"I know you want her back." She says. She still doesn't know what language she's speaking in, but she knows he understands. "But I can't find her. No one can. She's gone, and I -" _and I. And I can't do this. Not anymore._

The last part isn't in any language, but she knows he understands that, too. He always understands.

"I'm sorry."

She takes that one, tiny step. And then the world is spinning and she can feel the wind whipping at her skin with it's icy fingers and everything is upside down and sideways and for one blissful moment everything makes sense.

And then she hits the ground.

* * *

When she comes back she doesn't know what she thinks first, just that it's a combination of_ where am I_ and _I should be dead_ and _ow._ And then she realizes that it's all there, every memory right back in her head, stacked neatly where it should be. Except it's not neat, it's messy and painful and feels like everything just happened yesterday. She listens closer and hears a beeping noise that tells her she's in a hospital, and the sound of light breathing that tells her she isn't alone. That's the one thing that makes her force open her eyes to face the glaring lights - the thought that he's been here, waiting, since she stepped off the roof.

"Clint." She says, because even though he looks exhausted she knows he would want her to wake him. And he does, quickly, pulling himself up and reaching instinctively for his quiver before realizing where he is.

"Natasha?" He asks, and when she nods a smile breaks over his face and he swoops down to kiss her. She kisses him back for a second, but only that because every bone in her body hurts like hell. "I knew you'd come back." He says fiercely, and for some reason that's the only possible thing in the world that could make her smile.

"How?" She asks, and there's so many questions. How did they get her back, how did she survive the fall?

"You know, the whole cognitive recalibration technique you used on me?" Clint smirks at her. "Well, we tried that. As I'm sure you remember." There are flashes, of nervousness and anticipation and then a quick pain before unconsciousness. "Turns out you dying for 6 seconds did the trick."

"And the fall?"

"When I saw you go up to the roof, I told Phil. He got some nets set up along the ground. It almost wasn't enough. But it was."

And now there's nothing left to do but put her life together again.

"I'll help."

She hadn't realized she'd spoken aloud. Or maybe he really can read her mind.

She doesn't answer because she's falling asleep again and the last thing she hears are_ I'll be here_ and then a faint chuckle and _you've been speaking german, dummkopf_.

She feels a small smile touch her face. It's not a bad way to fall asleep.


End file.
